


where you can always go

by captainofthegreenpeas



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Book 3: Mockingjay, F/M, Fluff, Heavensdew, Mild Angst, Romance, Scraping the barrel for all my Tumblr content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-01
Updated: 2018-03-01
Packaged: 2019-03-25 18:10:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13840230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainofthegreenpeas/pseuds/captainofthegreenpeas
Summary: After the bombing in 13, Plutarch and Fulvia seek sunshine and honesty.





	where you can always go

He walked out in the open as if unsure of when he was about to wake. He did recall a story he had once read of a man who had risen from a tomb after three days, but Plutarch could not now believe it to have been less than three days. It felt like a lifetime.

 

Fulvia had thoughtlessly run ahead of him, leaving him to pace behind on older legs, more easily wearied. It was good, though, to see her happy again. She skipped, hopped and leapt around, feet drumming against the ground with a gentler thunder than the pummelling of the bombs, the hammering of panicked feet. There was an honest joy to her energy, but it was largely relief and relief does not come without pain.

 

Chuckling, she flung herself to the ground with a sigh, stretched out in the manner of a starfish, not caring about the dust or sharp pebbles. Then, remembering Plutarch in her glee, she jumped up again and ran over, took his hand and held it the way he always wanted her to.

 

“Come on.” She urged. “I want to make the most of this before we have to go back to the underworld.”

  
An apt allusion. Alma Coin did make a rather Hadean figure, but Boggs seemed too restrained to be her Cerberus. Though of late, the alliance between those two had been growing fainter… while the alliance with Gale Hawthorne had been growing brighter.

That worried him. Sooner or later he would have to turn against Coin and therefore by default against Coin’s guard dogs and if Hawthorne was among them… Katniss did indeed care for her “cousin” and Plutarch certainly knew better than to make an enemy of her. Perhaps if he could somehow put some distance between Hawthorne and Coin without the latter becoming suspicious, to fragment this new acquaintance. Have Hawthorne’s schedule shuffled to spend more time with Beetee, maybe. He could possibly trust Beetee to keep an eye on Gale. 

Beetee was largely politically neutral, devoted as he was purely to science, yet Plutarch was sure that when it came to choosing sides, he would be more likely to favour him over Coin. Plutarch had invested much time and effort in cultivating a friendship with Beetee over the years, overtly taking an interest in his work, eager to supply him with whatever tools he required, asking respectful and curious questions, unflinching in his attention to the answers. Such connections paid fruitful dividends; after all, Beetee would not forget that it was Plutarch, not Coin, who ultimately secured his release from the arena over Peeta.

  
Yet that tactic might not work in this case. He could not make any action that would keep Gale from Katniss’ reach a moment longer. She had after all made it a condition of being the Mockingjay to have him at her side.

 

Fulvia led him by the hand through the outer shell of overground Thirteen out to the borders where city met countryside. Mindful of the fact that he might not appreciate the hard ground as she did, she found a rock to serve as a bench and the two quietly sat upon it.

They watched the pattern of leaves’ shadows imprinted on the ground by the stamp of the sun, still hand in hand. Plutarch continued with his train of thought, the removal of Coin. When the time came, Fulvia would need to be gone. Turning on Coin would make her a target and if he tripped at the last step, Fulvia could finish it herself. Perhaps Beetee might shelter her, or Lyme. Coin would seek her out among the Capitol rebels, probably question Tigris first. But being hidden in plain sight in a busy district would buy her time.

 

“You were afraid.” She said at last. She had been staring into space. He imagined she had been staring into time as well.

  
“I was.”

  
“I’d never seen you afraid before.”

  
“You had. But that was a different kind of fear.” The fear of discovery, the fear of his home ransacked and put to the torch, his world crushed by fire, a broken down door, a Peacekeeper’s truncheon, Fulvia screaming, a room without shadows followed by execution or abandonment. Those fears were his brothers and sisters; and they kept breeding. If they did come true, it would be an easy, last dream. The fear the bombing had spawned was an immediate, mercurial fear that stormed his previous, plodding defences.

  
Plutarch knew that when he had surveyed the damage with Coin. There had been so many near misses, of course there had. Misses were always near. Fortuna liked to toy with them like that. So much of human history, he found, hinged upon her. As a more skilled writer than he had once said, the unlikeliest thing happened nine times out of ten.

  
“The wheel of fortune, little bee.” His grandmother, Juno, had told him that when he was eight. He remembered every word of it, long after her ashes filled her urn. “The ancients believed it; and for once they were right. The wheel can throw you very high, little bee. Oh, so very high. In fact, the wheel is the reason you’re a Capitol citizen in the first place. Not because of any virtue on your part, but because Fortune has placed you there. Enjoy her favour, little bee, fickle as it is. In the end, all it takes is a turn of the wheel to throw you down and another turn to crush you with the spokes. High, low, you cannot turn the wheel to your own bidding. Have a nice day at school.”

 

Plutarch gently swept the dust off of Fulvia, avoiding her unchanging gaze.

  
“Are you still frightened now?”

  
“Are you?” He sent her question right back.

  
“Yes.” Her answer was almost faster than the question. “I am. Because I have nowhere to go. Nowhere, at all. If we lose, my zip code changes to six feet under. Dead or alive, Thirteen’s going to kick me out when the war is over. They gave everyone from Twelve automatic citizenship, did they even bother asking us? No. And I know what you’re going to do if we win, you’re going to pack me off to Three or Four on the pretence of keeping me away from Coin.”

Tears started to slip down her face. Not a one had escaped during the bombings but they fled freely now.

“You’re going to fob me off on Beetee or Finnick and tidily be rid of me because you won’t need me anymore. You probably think I’ll be fine. I’ve been passed around like a hot potato my entire life, what difference does one more owner make? Why should I care? Why should you have to care? But I do care, because I don’t want to lose-”

  
She hastily swatted the tears away.

  
At first, he couldn’t seem to say anything. Plutarch had been under the impression that she would go of her own volition, make a new life without thought of whether he would miss her. The Rebellion had tied them together and once it was over he thought she’d cut herself loose and form a new tie.

There were lots of handsome young soldiers in Thirteen, she wasn’t blind. Why not one of them instead? What was there to stop her falling for one of them? Some brave strong strapping soul eager for adventure, keen to see the world beyond Thirteen?

Plutarch thought he’d be doing her a favour. Let her blamelessly go without the awkward “Um.. yeah, I’ve uh, met someone else. So yeah. I’m just.. going to.. say goodbye. Forever. Um… yeah bye.”

If he’d still been a silly youth, he’d kick up a fuss about it. Complain about how he hadn’t done anything wrong, why couldn’t they try, they’d be throwing away something good. But gentleman have discretion. Sensitivity. He thought he was being discreet. Just as Plutarch thought he had been discreet in the past, when he’d kept his distance from Fulvia for fear of unintentionally putting pressure on her or giving her the impression she was obliged or expected to… perform extra duties, so to speak, as his assistant. Plenty of Gamemakers did, after all. It was one of the silent entitlements that came with power. Fulvia would not have been surprised and it would have been vulgar to bring up the subject, so he might never have heard a word of complaint from Fulvia while she sat by his side silently despising him but donning her smile all the same.

 

When Fulvia had demanded to know why on earth she was being cold-shouldered without justification, as now, he realised he had been misinterpreted. Fulvia wore her heart on her sleeve. If she had a problem if him, he would know. Because she would tell him. Really quite loudly.

 

“Is that…” He stopped. “Is that what you think of me?”

  
“I don’t think. I fear. And I’m sick of it.”

  
“I didn’t mean to take away your agency. I thought you’d… like it. New setting, new friends, new job. I thought you’d want to… start again. I wanted to make it easier.”

  
“Easier?” Fulvia was incredulous. “You have strange ideas about what’s easy.”

She rested her head on her hands, her elbows on her knees. “Don’t make it easy.” Her voice was muffled by her hands, her face turned away. “Tell me now. Go on. Tell me to my face that you don’t love me. Tell me you want me gone. Because until you tell me I’m not leaving.”

  
Plutarch sat back and let the silence grow. With every second, he felt surer.

  
Slowly, her face turned back to him. Green eyes peeped through her fingers.

  
“I’m not deaf.”

  
“No, you hear very well.”

  
“You’re…” The silence stretched on again, only briefly interrupted. “You’re not… not going to say it.”

  
He shook his head. “I can’t.”

  
“Why?”

  
“I wouldn’t believe myself if I did." 

 

Slowly, with renewed calm, Fulvia straightened up, rolling back her shoulders and looking at him curiously. He wondered if the sun had warmed her hair. She was waiting.

 

“I don’t want half measures,” he promised. “I don’t like halfheartedness. I don’t want halfhearted love. And I can live alone. Lived alone for years. I can live alone again. If you never wanted to see me again, I could vanish quietly off your horizon. I would not shame you. I would not hate you. I would not turn on you. No. I wouldn’t do that. And after all that you have done, it would be cruel of me to put a price on my help. If all you want is my help, help is all I will give.  But if you still want the love that I have shown you I am capable of… that is not halfhearted. Because wherever there is a home for me, there will always be a home for you.”

 

Plutarch was suddenly aware that he might have been a little too forward. “If… you wanted it.”

 

Fulvia had listened quietly, still reading his face. “I’ve wanted it. Ever since you fell in that silly punch bowl-”

 

“No punch. Never drinking it again. Ever.” He grinned. “every time I try to forget, somebody brings it up again.” Plutarch laughed. 

 

“-I knew.” She cut in. "I knew that I was where I wanted to stay. Where I was cherished. Where I was wanted. Where I was home. Where I would always belong.”


End file.
